The Duggar family just announced that they are pregnant with #20. She is due in April as well. I thought that was kind of cool. I am sure her birth with make the news. I wonder how they do it with so many. I am on number 4 and know that there will be challenges, but lots of joy too. Is any one else devising, "How to do it" plans and ideas for dealing with a few little ones and a newborn? I think that I need to be more consistent with chore charts and responsibilities. I also need to be more disciplined with my own housekeeping. One big thing that I have struggled with has been taking care of myself as far as reducing stress and taking time out for myself. Anyone have any strategies for mental preparation?

First of all did you see how small she was? I am only on #2 and I am huge compared to her! You would think when you are on #20 you would pop before you even find out you are pregnant. lol!!

As for reducing stress, we live in a college town and I hired a grad student to clean my floors and bathrooms every two weeks for $25 each time. The morning before she comes we clear the counter tops in the bathrooms and get everything up off the floor to make it fast and easy for her. It takes her a little less than 2 hours and is worth every penny!

I have also started thinking of meals that would hold up in the freezer. I plan on making doubles of a lot of meals the last month or two of my pregnancy and putting one in the deep freeze. This will make it easy for my husband to throw a yummy nutritious meal together without asking me a ton of questions or ruining it. (He tries to help with dinner )

I hope to hear other peoples ideas!

Emilyjvg- I could not imagine having 4. How old are they?

Me (34) DH (33) We are the proud parents to Rebecca (11) and we are all three excited to welcome our newest addition April 20th.

Savingdinner.com has a lot of good stuff for freezing dinners. I have one of the books and plan to make some of those as well. The book has 5 recipes each for Pork, Beef, Chicken, and Fish and each of those make 4 dinners. If I choose 1 meat a week/month I could potentially have 20 meals saved in the freezer. I currently have 3 girls (here's hoping for a boy!) ages 8, 4 and 2.

Emily I also have 3 girls (8,5,2 who will be 9,6,3 when baby comes). I haven't decided if I want a boy or a girl yet. Not that I get a choice in the matter.

I have not begun to think of any plans to make things easier. I know I have friends who will bring me food after baby is born and my Hubs always takes 2 weeks off after the birth..although he works for himself now so I don't know how that will work. Plus my sister is coming to stay with me for a week shortly after my due date.

Courtney and Cree, baby made 3, added one more then there were 4, sakes alive, then we had 5, another in the mix now we have 6!

A Momma in love with her Little Women-Jewel Face, Jo Jo Bean, June Bug, and Sweet Coraline.

I should have lots of help after the birth. I think the hardest time is always 1 -6 months down the road. At least it will be spring and the kids can go outside. My eldest is in school, its just keeping the others occupied. I am not a very structured person, so I think I need to have some structure.

I am one of eight. I think that it is somewhat true that after so many it doesn't make much difference, but I think there is still some transition time. I remember crazy moments as a kid. not the end of the world but perhaps preventable. I just don't want a rude awakening I guess.

I must have missed the announcement that the Duggars are expecting #20! I was wondering if she was going to keep having kids after the scare with #19. I know that it is against her beliefs to prevent pregnancy, though. (I am anti birth control... and thankfully I am only on #4, DH wants to get fixed though).

I come from a family of 9 children, so I am WAY used to being around A LOT of kids. I am the 4th born, so I was always a MommaHen

I completely understand when it comes to not keeping up with housework and self care. I was in my pajamas until about 2pm today... although I do have to say that I was up half the night again with this insomnia junk This has been going on for a few weeks now. It stinks.

I need to get on the ball with organizing... somehow I have to fit another kid in this small 3 bedroom house!

We are expecting #4 as well...we also live in a 3 bedroom house. It's not super small but bedroom space is limited. If this one is a girl, she'll most likely get the small spare bedroom and our other 3(boys) will most likely share a room until we either move...or they go to college! LOL

I, too, think I'll be freezing a lot of meals. My hubby travels for work(2wks away/2wks home) and I'll need to have my house organized etc. Plus, next year is my first official homeschooling year with my oldest(I have a 5.5yo, 3.5yo and 16mos old) so I can imagine it's going to be crazy!!!

FlyLady has helped a lot with organization, but I need to get back on track especially before baby. Establish some good routines and get ahead. We too have a 3 bedroom but with 3 girls we could have them in one and the baby in the other. My thought: if Boy keep it as it is and then when #2 goes to school in the fall she can go into my older daughters room. The 2 yr old and baby can be roomies until 2 yr old is in school then I can move the three school age daughters back to the bigger room and the boy can have the smaller room. If I have another daughter it has to be 2 and 2 I guess. Room is a little tight, but there are so many families around the world that do with so much less space. I know that we can make this work and have sanity too. I am using it as kinda a fun challenge. Like reducing waste and making greener choices. I know that I want to establish some, "rules" or boundaries for my daughters so they can be secure. For instance: If kids share a room they each have there own space. If that is a desk, a shelf, and bed or similar that's okay. Just some non-shared spot for them that is strictly off limits to others. That makes sharing a little better. I am one of 8 and I had 5 brothers until I was 12 and a little girl came along. All of that time I had my own room and my brothers shared. When my sister came I shared with her but she was my shadow at that point and it didn't matter. Sharing worked for our family and created some fun experiences. I want that closeness for our family. The ability to work together to resolve conflict. Anyways...One note on homeschooling. I was homeschooled and I homeschooled for two years with little ones. Some advice I learned the second year that made a big difference. Plan a 4 day week. This gives you one day for errands, baby day, catch up day, or housework day. Made things a TON easier. I got way more done in my 4 day week year then my 5 day week year. Just my two cents.

I'm so excited for them and her excitement was infectious to me. I am pregnant with #7.

We have four boys still at home, one in college (home on weekends w/his own/guest room). The little boys share the 'bunk room'. It's a 15x15 room that we designed to stack all the boys in. Room is not the issue for us - clothes are the issue! I save and pass down all their clothes so we have gobs and gobs of tubs. Plus, I just keep too many clothes out for them. I culled some the last big laundry day. I wish we could go back to the 'family closet' but my dh is resistant. I loved our family closet - it made my life sooooo much easier!

Come April I'll have a 6yo, 4yo, 2yo and newborn, plus my 15yo, my adult mentally challenged cousin, dh and myself. I am a full-time college student. I am definitely a 'messy' as are all my kids. Housekeeping is a struggle for me.

Check out Flylady. She is great for "Messys"! I too have a lot of tubs of clothes. With 3 girls they just keep getting more. That is the biggest reason I am finding out the sex of this baby. So if its a boy, I can get rid of the girl clothes. I figure the majority of them have gone through 3 kids, I can get rid of them. If the baby is a girl I want to keep the clothes for one more but I will weed down majorly. I wish I could get the 10 outfit system down or the clothes formula that so many organized women use, but it is so hard to chose between outfits. I tend to keep too much.

I hear you about self discipline. I totally understand where your coming from when it comes to stick-to-it ness. I just like the whole Routine thing. When I establish a HABIT and have routines. Everything is sooooo much better. If I do the same things every day I can keep up. If I miss it every once in awhile its Okay, but if I forget once and give up the whole shooting match I am in trouble. Flylady's mantra is that you are never behind you don't have to catch up, just pick up and start where you left off. That to me is my biggest challenge. I am kinda an all or nothing person. I am trying to learn that, "Doing it halfway still blesses my family." Even if I mess up I can keep going in the right direction. I am determined not to let my previous inconsistencies, inadequacies and perfectionism effect the rest of my life. I think that I can change for the future and I am going to keep going in that direction. Even though I am a messy now, I want to be somewhat clean and organized down the road. I don't think that I will ever have a perfect home, but I want to be closer to sanity and I am not willing to wait until my kids are older to get there. I am 32 and not too old to learn something new. Here is my start to transforming a messy into a somewhat cleany!! (Can I do it before April?) Sorry ladies for the rant, I am just giving myself a peptalk :)

I hear you about self discipline. I totally understand where your coming from when it comes to stick-to-it ness. I just like the whole Routine thing. When I establish a HABIT and have routines. Everything is sooooo much better. If I do the same things every day I can keep up. If I miss it every once in awhile its Okay, but if I forget once and give up the whole shooting match I am in trouble. Flylady's mantra is that you are never behind you don't have to catch up, just pick up and start where you left off. That to me is my biggest challenge. I am kinda an all or nothing person. I am trying to learn that, "Doing it halfway still blesses my family." Even if I mess up I can keep going in the right direction. I am determined not to let my previous inconsistencies, inadequacies and perfectionism effect the rest of my life. I think that I can change for the future and I am going to keep going in that direction. Even though I am a messy now, I want to be somewhat clean and organized down the road. I don't think that I will ever have a perfect home, but I want to be closer to sanity and I am not willing to wait until my kids are older to get there. I am 32 and not too old to learn something new. Here is my start to transforming a messy into a somewhat cleany!! (Can I do it before April?) Sorry ladies for the rant, I am just giving myself a peptalk :)

So... A couple of days after I posted this, I had a 16 week miscarriage. It was kinda traumatizing, but I am working through it. Thinking about my post, I know that there is a lot of things I want to work on personally before we try again. I don't expect to be perfect, but I want a few things in order first. I know that I am capable of making these changes and making them a habit. I want to be careful not to go overboard, though. Grief has the tendency to make us do irrational things and go overboard. I want to be careful that my motivation is not to drown my emotion, but to better myself and my family life in the process. Flylady talks about keeping an orderly home is a blessing to our family and ourselves. That I can appreciate. The whole shoe thing is so minor in the big scale of things. I don't have to do that if it doesn't make a difference. There are so many other things that Flylady says that makes sense for my type of personality. She was like me enough that it gives me inspiration that there is hope for me too. Part of my messy and perfectionist personality is that I tend to do, "All or nothing" with things and burn out. I am determined not to do that now. If I have to add one new habit in my life every month and nothing else then that is what I am willing to do to change. I have my own system that I started but did not actually follow through with that is similar to Flylady's zone system. I think I am going to pick that up and work on creating routines so that it gets done. Thanks for everyone's support on this site, I know that I can always come here and get some great words of wisdom. Thanks Ladies.

I am so sorry for your loss Emily. When I had a loss earlier this year I felt much the same way and did get much more organized and it has been such a huge blessing. I hope your healing is strengthening as well, you are in my thoughts.